I'm Thinking About Moving to Tevinter
by Sarah1281
Summary: No one wants to face a long-distance relationship but Dorian has an uphill battle ahead of him if he wants to have any hope of convincing Lucas Cadash that even if dwarves do have it pretty good in the Imperium that whole Herald of Andraste thing means he really, really shouldn't move there. Lucas may or may not be planning out their entire future. For dwarf appreciation week.


Lucas Cadash announced his presence by declaring, "I'm thinking about moving to Tevinter."

Dorian dropped his book. "No."

"I am, actually," Lucas insisted. "Thoughts?"

"No," Dorian said again.

Lucas nodded. "Okay, you already said that and I realize that I wasn't being specific when I asked for thoughts but I kind of meant that I wanted more than you just saying the same word over and over again."

"No."

"See, you keep doing it," Lucas said. "And I try to be understanding, I do, but you're really giving me nothing to work with. I can't make heads or tails of what you're trying to tell me."

Dorian shook himself and stood up, walking over to Lucas. "Sorry, I just…you can't move to Tevinter."

"I mean, I can't think of a single reason why I _can't_ ," Lucas said.

Dorian rolled his eyes. "Fine, fine, you literally can but you really _really_ shouldn't."

Lucas just shook his head. "I don't understand you."

Dorian let out a startled laugh. "Me? _You_ don't understand _me_?"

"I did just say that. We're getting a little better, moving on to real words, but I feel this conversation will remain stymied if we have to confirm every new statement one of us makes before we can move on."

"Tevinter is terrible. Everyone knows that."

"Everyone knows that I'm the Herald of Andraste because I stumbled into a room and touched an orb and was pushed out of the Fade by the Divine. And everyone knows the Rite of Tranquility absolutely cannot be reversed and so I guess Cassandra has no emotions or something. And let's not even get started on Andraste being the Bride of the Maker even though their own teachings say she turned him down to go back home and 'the Maker took only her with him when he ditched the world' makes marriage a very generous interpretation."

"Don't move there."

"You're moving there," Lucas countered.

"To try and make it _less_ terrible," Dorian said. "I really cannot overstate how terrible it currently is. So terrible I jumped at the chance to come here and deal with Corypheus."

"I thought you did that because it was the right thing to do."

Dorian nodded. "And so I did. But if Tevinter was less terrible I probably would have complained more."

Lucas grinned. "I don't think it's humanly possible for you to have complained more."

"First of all, challenge accepted," Dorian said. "And you should never issue challenges to people from Tevinter. It's the cause of at least half of the world's problems. And secondly, _terrible_."

"That's why I should go," Lucas said. "I am a delightful person and my presence has been known to make any situation less terrible."

Dorian raised his hand and looked like he was about to say something but didn't.

"See? You can't even argue with me."

"Not about that, no, but I really don't want you to go there."

"And I don't want _you_ to go there but that doesn't seem to have stopped you from throwing yourself back there," Lucas countered.

Dorian crossed his arms. "You said you understood!"

"I do. But I think my dramatic sulking may have gotten another point across as well."

"You certainly do excel at dramatic sulking," Dorian admitted. "Though I wish you hadn't dragged me along to go dragon hunting with you when you did."

"Iron Bull swore up and down that dragon hunting was the best way to deal with your emotions," Lucas said.

"And he told _me_ that dragon hunting was the best way to get over a hangover. He just really likes dragon hunting," Dorian said.

"What's wrong with that?" Lucas said. "I like dragon hunting, too. And dragons. I love that there are still dragons and I also love killing them and I'm so proud of the fact I've killed ten high dragons but I'm also kind of wondering if I should be worrying about whether I'm going to single-handedly contribute to the dragons really going extinct this time. Not…that I really get how people thought they were extinct and now there's dozens flying around terrorizing people. This might be a problem."

"THIS is a problem?" Dorian couldn't believe it. "Not your mad wish to move to Tevinter?"

"No, I don't really see that as a problem. Your inexplicable need to stop me is a bit of one but, honestly, it's not 'dragons going extinct' level of a problem. Sorry. Just being objective."

"And I wouldn't have minded your mad dragon hunt if you didn't always drag me along with you," Dorian said.

Lucas shrugged. "I take you everywhere, though. It's like that time that it didn't occur to me that taking you along when we were trying to get that Qunari alliance was a bad idea."

"Can we talk about how you could have possibly failed to notice that was a bad idea? I'm from Tevinter, they're Qunari. And sure, Iron Bull keeps his comments to a minimum but he's not exactly what you'd call a traditional Qunari. The other guy was an ex-slave!"

"How was I supposed to know he'd be an ex-slave?" Lucas asked, blinking.

"Trust me. Whenever they are not biologically Qunari – or whatever that race is – they're _always_ ex-slaves from Tevinter. Always. And they always hate you."

"No, I think they just hate you. Because of you being from Tevinter and all. I get along with them just fine. And I just feel like maybe they have a reason to be upset in that case," Lucas said. "That's why you added slavery to the list of like thirty other things you need to try and fix about Tevinter. Besides, it's not like you _had_ to start an argument about Tevinter versus Qunari right there."

"I did, actually. It's part of being from Tevinter. But you could have avoided all of it if you just hadn't taken me."

"You could have reminded me that Tevinter and the Qunari had a problem with each other."

Dorian laughed. "It didn't occur to me you had literally forgotten about it. How do you forget about something like that?"

Lucas shrugged. "It's hard to keep track of you surfacers and your ways."

"You were born on the surface, Lucas. That really doesn't fly."

"I don't really make an effort to stay on top of current events," Lucas said with another shrug.

"I know. And Leliana and Josephine despair of it. But there's nothing recent about something that's been going on for hundreds of years."

"I mean, if you had said something like 'Hey, Lucas, remember how Tevinter and the Qunari have been at war with each other on and off for hundreds of years' I'd probably have been like 'oh, yeah, they were.' It's not like I didn't know that. It just slipped my mind on account of how little it has impacted my life."

"I'm not going to lie, sometimes I really wonder how you function as a person."

"Quite wonderfully," came the bright response. "And you can't say you don't understand why I want to go with you."

"Not really," Dorian said. "I mean, I'll be there, of course, but other than that…so very terrible…"

"You being there is all the reason I need," Lucas said. "And I don't even get why you don't want me to go anyway. I'm beginning to feel insulted that you want me to be a whole country away from you."

Dorian gave him a look. "You know that's not it."

"Until you give me a better reason I will be forced to make up more and more outlandish reasons why you don't want me there. I'm currently considering the prospect you're planning on leaving me for my better-looking twin brother who you _will_ let move there."

"You don't even have a twin brother and if you did I'm sure he wouldn't look half as good as you do," Dorian said.

Lucas nodded. "That's what's so emotionally devastating about the whole thing."

Dorian rolled his eyes. "I already told you I don't want you to just go to Tevinter and do the whole thing yourself. _I_ want to help reform my country, not politely clap while you kill people until we're living in an egalitarian paradise."

"Come now, Dorian. If all the problems in Tevinter could be fixed by me coming in and spending a few days killing the right people and making heartfelt speeches it really wouldn't be in the dreadful state you keep insisting that it is in."

"You spending a few years killing the right people and making heartfelt speeches wouldn't really be any better."

"And if I _could_ fairly easily fix things, is it really worth not fixing things just because you want to feel accomplished? I mean, it seems a little ridiculous."

"It's not like _that_ ," Dorian insisted. "And the whole thing would have a very different slant to it if the Herald of Andraste, bosom companion of the White Divine, were to try and do it than if the son of a magister with rather unorthodox views did it. We may rarely be of one mind but if there's one thing we can always agree about it is that we will not be conquered."

"And this is assuming I would even be doing anything to fix Tevinter. I mean, I wouldn't try to make anything _worse_ but it's kind of a big assumption I would go there and try to reform everything."

"You wouldn't?" Dorian asked, surprised.

"I would absolutely _love_ to be the one politely clapping while you killed people and…whatever else you have to do to reform a country," Lucas said. "I don't actually know much about that. Pass laws? Fund public works? Have people who aren't slavers or blood mage cultists visit the south?"

"Really," Dorian said skeptically. "You'd just watch while I did all the work?"

"Well it's pretty clear I have no idea how to reform a country."

"That is true," Dorian said. "I'm not entirely sure I have that much better of an idea but I at least know more about Tevinter than you. And you could kill people, certainly. Killing the right people would help."

Lucas raised an eyebrow. "So now you're trying to talk me into helping you reform Tevinter when you don't actually want me to play any part in it?"

"Well, no," Dorian said. "I just…can't really believe you would be there and not trying or accidentally taking charge of everything when you see all the injustice and slavery and terminal short-sightedness and all."

"I really don't know what I did to make you think I would not love to go to a place with problems and let somebody else deal with it for a change," Lucas said, raising his eyes skyward.

"It's the 'for a change part', really," Dorian said. "You did bring massive political reform to Ferelden and Orlais and, to a lesser extent, some of the other nations. You even got my people to pretend they weren't secretly rooting for the Venatori with a bit more effort. And that may not seem like much but, trust me, it is."

"And all of that was entirely under duress," Lucas insisted.

"Under duress," Dorian repeated. "You became the most powerful man in Thedas under duress."

"Yes. And I would not call myself the most powerful man in Thedas."

"You literally decided if Briala, Celene, or Gaspard would rule Orlais."

Lucas rolled his eyes. "By deciding if I was going to save Celene's life or not. That Ferelden mercenary guy could have done that. Would you call him the most powerful man in Thedas?"

"That is not even remotely the same thing."

"I'm just saying, all I did was decide if Celene was going to live. If she was she was empress. It's not like I got to choose between the candidates and I don't know why everyone keeps acting like Briala was actually an option. She was never an option. She was an elf."

"You could have used blackmail or tried to reunite her and Celene or something like that," Dorian said. "You did find a lot of blackmail material and a locket, after all."

"If people are so careless as to just leave highly incriminating information just lying around when they're also kind of expecting me, at the very least, to be wandering around snooping then they have no one to blame but themselves and I'm still not the most powerful man in Thedas."

"I would keep arguing with you but I suspect you'd find a way to dismiss yourself as the most powerful man in Thedas no matter how many of your clearly most powerful man in Thedas moments I bring up."

Lucas nodded. "I love that you know that about me."

Dorian couldn't help a smile at that. "Can we at least get back to the bit about you doing this under duress?"

Lucas shrugged. "Sure but what is there to say? I was at the conclave because my friends were going and I heard there was free food and then next thing I know I'm imprisoned and Cassandra was telling me people wanted me executed for murdering the Divine before I even woke up and I have a weird Breach mark that's trying to kill me and, by the way, could I please close the Breach in the sky? The implications were really, really obvious."

"Okay, maybe," Dorian said. "And if the Breach destroyed all life, you'd die, too. Not that that kind of thing stopped the Venatori but they were mostly all idiots so that's not a surprise. But what about after the Breach was closed?"

"And Corypheus was still plotting to destroy all life and wanted to murder me, personally? And people were insisting on following me around no matter what I did because I was Andraste's own chosen and the Inquisitor or whatever? Yes, so much choice there."

"I love how you manage to make being the most powerful person in Thedas seem like something you were helpless to stop," Dorian said.

Lucas crossed his arms. "It is how I see the situation."

"I don't see why you keep complaining about the power, either. It seems pretty useful and certainly got the job done."

"Yes but they give me power and suddenly I have to do things about it. As I keep trying to tell you, I don't want to be a reformer. But if they elect you Inquisitor and you have Corypheus out to murder you and the Anchor what are you supposed to do?"

"And if they beg for your help in Tevinter and don't give you a choice?" Dorian countered.

"I think they're too busy hating me and barely pretending they weren't secretly rooting for Corypheus to kill us all to do that," Lucas said. "And at any rate, I've retired. No more world saving for me. Let someone else do it. The Inquisition is over."

"You wouldn't have the heart to just not save the day the next time a crisis arises," Dorian accused.

"Watch me. I am strictly in this to stop the end of the world and if not it is not my problem."

"You're just saying that so I'll let you move to Tevinter."

"I wasn't aware you were some kind of border guard," Lucas said. "Do I need a letter of reference, too?"

Dorian rolled his eyes. "And the Inquisition is not over. It's amassing more and more power by the day. Corypheus may be two years dead but I've never seen the Inquisition look healthier."

"Yeah but next month they're having an Exalted Council or something to go yell at us about the fact we still exist and keep ignoring them when they try to tell us we can't just do whatever we want and ignore everyone else's opinion," Lucas said dismissively.

"And…you think they're going to want the Inquisition disbanded?" Dorian asked.

Lucas snorted. "Ferelden, certainly. Orlais seems to want us to be Orlesian. I don't care. I'll probably just insist on existing because I don't want other people telling me if the organization I was kind of forced to help found can exist or not and then I'm moving to Tevinter so none of this will be my problem."

"You really can't move to Tevinter."

"Look, I already promised to leave all the reforming to you. What more do you want?" Lucas asked.

"It's just not safe there," Dorian said. "Everyone will try to kill you."

"People try to kill me here all the time," Lucas said dismissively. "And I do like a good assassination attempt. It gives me the opportunity to kill people without anyone judging me or taking a political stance."

"More people will try to assassinate you using blood magic and poison instead of direct ambushes which, of course, you excel at," Dorian said.

"I know how to deal with poison," Lucas said, sounding almost insulted. "And I'm highly resistant to magic. I'll be fine."

"You can't just say you'll be fine and make it so!"

"Neither can you," Lucas argued.

"Well…I have reason to be there. And it is my home."

"It will be my home once I move there," Lucas said. "And I have a reason, too. His name is Dorian."

"You're being impossible," Dorian complained.

"You're the one attempting to stop me from moving to another country," Lucas said. "And, anyway, what else do I have to do? There's nothing really keeping me here."

"Nothing but _the Inquisition_ ," Dorian said archly.

Lucas waved that off. "Corypheus has been dead for like two years now. If Teagan weren't being such a dick I'd probably have already left, to be honest."

"What about Solas?"

"What _about_ Solas?" Lucas said, looking mystified.

"He took off and he's probably up to something nefarious," Dorian said. "Didn't you say he practically admitted that it was all his fault that Corypheus was a threat in the first place?"

"That's overstating it a little," Lucas said. "But he did say something ominous about how this was not the way it was supposed to happen and, no matter what, remember what good friends we were. I would absolutely not be surprised if he showed up one day trying to kill everyone."

"Then shouldn't you stick around trying to find him?"

"What's the point?" Lucas asked.

"What's the- _what's the point_? You believe he's trying to kill everyone!"

"Yes," Lucas allowed. "But he's not trying to kill everyone right now. Probably. I'd have probably noticed if he was."

"So, what, as long as he's not actively trying to kill everyone at this moment it's fine to let him be?"

"We can hardly take him to task for things he hasn't done and it's not like we can prove he had anything to do with Corypheus," Lucas said. "And why bother looking for a single elf apostate who has never been captured by templars when we could just wait until he starts trying to kill everyone and deal with it then?"

"That seems remarkably irresponsible of you," Dorian said. "And wouldn't you have to come back from Tevinter to deal with it then?"

Lucas grinned. "I'm so glad you're coming around on me moving."

"I am not!"

"The Inquisition can still look for him without me. I'm kind of useless on the scouting and espionage fronts anyway. And I can always come back to deal with him and then return to Tevinter. It's not like if I go I am stuck there forever or anything."

"You _really_ have nothing you need to be doing here? Nothing at all?"

"I keep telling you I don't," Lucas replied. "I even got fired from the carta! Nobody gets fired from the carta! Everyone gets killed for trying to leave! How is this even my life?"

Dorian had asked himself that question a lot over the years. More frequently than he would have thought once he'd joined the Inquisition. Of course, that wasn't always a bad thing. "You were _fired_ from the carta? I knew you were a member but I thought you left it when you became the Herald of Andraste."

"I mean, it's not like I was ever planning on going back. So I guess this is technically a good thing. And I didn't expect them to really go after me over it because it would just not be worth the headache and other carta members knowing I'm not part of it anymore because I got all caught up in the Inquisition isn't exactly going to inspire them since they can't do what I did. But fired by the carta. It's humiliating," he complained.

"What happened?" Dorian asked. "This is the first I'm hearing about this."

"Because of how humiliating it is," Lucas explained. "They told me I was too much of a hassle and they didn't need to be involved with the Chantry and darkspawn and crazy cultists. They told me the carta valued my many years of service but that my services were no longer needed and they hoped I would find great success with the Inquisition. This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me."

Dorian raised an eyebrow. "The worst thing? Are you serious?"

"Well, I know it doesn't compare to the worst thing that has happened to you and some of the others but, yes, I really do think it is. It's not watching your brother get beheaded bad but it's what I've got."

"I have literally witnessed worse things than this happen to you."

"Like what?" Lucas challenged.

"Well you got a splinter the other day," Dorian said.

"Dorian, this is serious. I know I didn't actually want to be in the carta and had no plans to go back but I'm the first and only person to be literally fired from it! I'm not good enough for the freaking carta! Everyone's good enough for the carta!"

"How about that time that a dragon almost ate you?"

Lucas laughed. "That was one of the best moments of my life."

"Of _course_ it was."

"I'm just saying, what a way to go. I want to be eaten by a dragon, by the way. If I don't die being eaten by one, please feed my remains to one."

"You don't want to be, I don't know, returned to the stone or something?"

"Not even a little," Lucas said. "I want to be dragon food. I should write that down."

"…Moving on, then, what about that time you spent hours running around killing undead creatures only to realize that you were so strong that you were literally getting nothing out of doing that?" Dorian asked.

"That was rather frustrating," Lucas admitted. "But killing undead creatures still provides a valuable service to the world so I'd have to say it's still not as bad."

"Fine. How about that time that you had to go with Bianca and Varric on that mission and found out it was all Bianca's fault we have to deal with red lyrium because she literally gave a piece Varric had to Corypheus? And then she threatened you if anything happened to Varric and Varric got mad at you when you made her cry?"

Lucas hesitated. "Well, that was pretty bad. And he didn't even let me finish explaining to her why she was the literal worst. I mean, I already didn't like her and then two minutes after finding out she fucked up and gave it to Corypheus – and 'it was an accident' doesn't mean it didn't happen – she has the gall to start threatening me?"

"So…worse than being fired from the carta?" Dorian asked hopefully.

Stubbornly, Lucas shook his head. "Varric got over it and will probably never bring me and Bianca into contact again. I'm _still fired_."

"So you don't have anything to do here. What about your friends? You wouldn't want to leave them, would you?"

"I love you way more than I like any of them," Lucas said, shrugging.

Dorian smiled. "And I appreciate that but there are so many more of them than there are of me."

"Honestly I don't even like half of them."

"But they all adore you!" Dorian exclaimed, surprised.

"I'm not actually as bad at diplomacy as people would expect," Lucas said.

"Okay but now you _have_ to tell me which ones you don't like. Or can I guess? I want to guess."

"Feel free," Lucas said. "You might as well think about it because I'm not going to even tell you until we're in Tevinter."

"You're not going to Tevinter."

"Agree to disagree," Lucas said cheerfully.

"You said you were only thinking about it!"

"Well I haven't moved _yet_ ," Lucas pointed out. "Ergo it is only something I'm thinking about, not something I'm currently doing."

"Allow me to register my continued disgust at your abuse of technicalities."

Lucas nodded. "So noted. And did you know Sera wanted me to be a Red Jenny? Like, really?"

Dorian perked up. "Oh, that's good. Sounds like a very nice non-Tevinter thing to keep you down here."

"But it's like…stealing trousers and collecting bees and I don't even know how any of it works. And I think it would make Sera my boss. You can never work for someone who you were once the superior of. Very humiliating."

"You really need to get over your humiliation thing," Dorian said.

Lucas made a face. "That's what Bull said and we don't talk about what happened then."

"I don't think the Red Jennies operate on such an organized level anyway," Dorian said. "There are no bosses."

"I do not understand like half the things Sera says. She's kicked a few Red Jenny missions the Inquisition's way and she is clearly some kind of savant or something because doing things like turning out the lights or walking through a town produce amazing results but I don't understand any of it. I can't even decipher the weird little lines she leaves saying what she wants to do. She can take small things like leaving a pie on a windowsill and see how it can help people but since I'm so hopeless I'd have to defer to her and that would make her basically my boss and I'd so much rather just move to Tevinter with you."

Dorian was quiet for several moments.

"Um, is everything okay?" Lucas asked eventually. "You didn't really have your heart set on me being a Red Jenny, did you? Because, I mean, I guess I could try but I _really_ don't think it's the right fit for me. Even worse than the Inquisition and I tell everyone who asks, and many who don't, about how I don't believe in Andraste or even the Maker. They never seem to hear me."

"No, it's not that," Dorian said reluctantly. "It's just…I couldn't stop you from coming, I suppose, and I can't really ask you not to come if you love me because that would make what we have conditional and that's not what either of us wants. And if I did you'd only say that if I loved you I'd let you come."

Lucas nodded. "It's true, I would. And I would hate it if we started saying things like that so please don't."

"Maybe I can't stop you from coming," Dorian said. "But perhaps I could discourage you."

"I doubt that," Lucas said. "I'm very difficult to motivate and even harder to discourage."

"This isn't an ultimatum and I'm not saying I am but…what if I broke up with you?" Dorian asked hesitantly. "Would that be enough to keep you here and keep you safe?"

To Dorian's great surprise, Lucas smiled gently at that. "Dorian, that may be the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me."

It took him a minute to find his voice. "Okay, I know that that is not the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to you. It's not anywhere near the sweetest thing _I_ have ever said to you, in fact."

"I mean, it's difficult to quantify these things," Lucas admitted. "You have said some very sweet things to me over the years. But I really think this is the best."

"How is that sweet? At all?" Dorian demanded. "I'm floating the possibility of leaving you."

"To _protect_ me," Lucas said. "I mean, it's terribly misguided and trying to deprive me of my agency and whatnot but the intention is pure. You love me and clearly want to be with me since you keep coming back here after visiting Tevinter, despite your desire to reform it, and because we're still together. But you'd make yourself miserable to try and keep me safe because I'm just that important to you! How could I not find that ridiculously sweet?"

"That's not how I'd take it if you tried to break up with me for my own good," Dorian admitted.

"Duly noted. Though I would never do anything so self-sabotaging, I assure you. Like, I can't think of anything in the world that would ever compel me to break up with you. No, I'm afraid you'll have to dump me if you ever want to stop dating."

Dorian felt himself starting to smile despite himself. It really wasn't the time. "And I'm in the process of deciding if I should do that right now. Why would it be misguided?"

"Because it wouldn't stop me," Lucas said bluntly.

Dorian cocked his head. "Why wouldn't it stop you? You want to go to Tevinter because you love me and I will be there. If I break up with you-"

"Then I'll still love you and you'll still be in Tevinter," Lucas interrupted.

"But we would be apart so there's no point in going to Tevinter," Dorian argued.

Lucas smirked. "See, that's where you're wrong. I could hang around and try to get you to change your mind. Or I could kind of creepily stalk you while you go about your life. I could stick around out of spite or to prove a point because if we broke up over me moving to Tevinter I'm certainly not going to _not_ move to Tevinter. Or I could just have a lot of rebound sex, I don't know. I'm a little curious, actually, but not enough that I recommend you break up with me so we'd find out."

"I can't decide if that's an ultimatum or not," Dorian said.

Lucas laughed. "What, don't break up with me or I'll act like someone who has been broken up with? Hardly. I just know myself."

"So that plan's out then," Dorian said, sounding rather cheerful about the prospect.

"If you insist," Lucas said graciously. "You know, you can deny it all you like but it's things like that that make you such a ridiculously good person."

Dorian rolled his eyes. "Oh, I am not. Ask anyone."

"Ask anyone about how you're the good Tevinter and the magister from evil Tevinter?" Lucas asked innocently.

"Well…I mean, ask them before I helped kill Corypheus."

"Two years late for that, dear," Lucas said.

"I'm not a good person. I refuse."

"We're literally having this pseudo-argument because you want to both keep me safe and to go home and fix your super messed up homeland," Lucas said. "Face it, Dorian, you're pretty much the best person I know."

"Isn't that a terrifying concept," Dorian muttered.

"Some days, yes, though not for the reasons you'd think."

Dorian cleared his throat and looked down.

"Even if I do hate that silly Tevene game you play."

"And which one is that?" Dorian asked.

"The one where you keep switching up how you pronounce Tevene words to see if us poor non-speakers will ever notice."

"I told you it was for _research_ ," Dorian claimed. "You wouldn't deny me my _research_ , would you?"

"Never," Lucas admitted. "But I didn't even know there were that many ways to say Amatus! Or was it Amatus? Amatus? How do you pronounce it, anyway? Like, really?"

"Amatus," Dorian replied. "My apologies but it is endlessly amusing. You should have seen the look on your face the first time I switched pronunciations up on you. It took more than a week before you were confident enough to ask me about it."

"I just didn't want to embarrass you," Lucas claimed. "Imagine, me – someone decidedly not proficient in Tevene – calling you out on the fact that you're not just pronouncing a word wrong but you can't even pick one wrong pronunciation and stick with it."

Dorian laughed. "You're so kind, really."

"I try to be."

"Of course, if you were really trying you'd let me know that I was embarrassing myself by using different pronunciations which would make even the most unobservant of people realize at least one version had to be wrong," Dorian said.

"Maybe no one else noticed it. I mean, it's not like you're saying that word to anyone else," Lucas said.

"Trust me, if you noticed it then Iron Bull noticed it before I even said it," Dorian said. "The man is very good at what he does."

"He is," Lucas agreed. "I won't even be mad at him if he tries to kill us all. I mean, I'll still kill him but respect, you know?"

"Well I will be," Dorian said. "Still, I do not see that happening. But I guess if he were going to and we did see it coming then he would not be nearly as skilled as we know him to be so you have a fair point there."

"Yay. I do love having a point. But, getting back to that thing you're absolutely not going to distract me from, it's not like you're the only reason I would want to move to Tevinter anyway. Even if you are at least ninety percent my reason."

"What other _possible_ reason could you have? I did mention it's terrible recently, have I not?"

"You did," Lucas said. "But people would probably stop trying to get me to do stuff and calling me the Herald of Andraste and at this point I'd almost prefer an assassination attempt than more people trying to get a lock of my hair for a holy relic."

"You do get that an awful lot," Dorian conceded.

"Dwarves have it kind of made in the Imperium," Lucas said. "I mean, I've never been there but I've heard things. People always talk about how those that think Tevinter is some kind of mage paradise are misinformed because, while they can't be imprisoned for being mages, only noble mages get the kind of perks people think of when they think of Tevinter. You can still be poor or get enslaved or something like that. But being a dwarf in the Imperium is supposed to be great!"

"Because of the Ambassadoria?"

Lucas nodded. "Because of the Ambassadoria. Dwarves are the only people that can't be slaves and we're not citizens but we're pretty much foreign dignitaries? And there's proving grounds around and all the comforts of Orzammar? Sign me up!"

"You've never been to Orzammar."

"No but I've always meant to go and now that I'm Inquisitor I probably can and I've heard it's lovely. A bit claustrophobic if that kind of thing bothers you, and it doesn't, but lovely." He paused. "You should let me take you to Orzammar."

"Better Orzammar than Tevinter."

"Oh, no, we can still do that after," Lucas said cheerfully. "And while Tevinter may not appreciate me saving the world because they would frankly like to see everyone south of the border be subject to chaos and death, I'm optimistic the dwarves will appreciate me getting rid of a proto-darkspawn and his pseudo-blight."

"I honestly have no idea."

"And it will be nice to go to a place for once that doesn't assume I'm a mercenary or a merchant."

"You did spend half your life in the carta is all I'm saying," Dorian said.

"Yes and now I've been tragically fired so I'd like people to stop saying things like that," Lucas said. "And I can even keep my caste because it's technically underground, right?"

"You _could_ ," Dorian said slowly. "Except you were born on the surface and don't have a caste."

"I'm sure I could get one if I wanted one. Maybe something to bring up when we're in Orzammar," Lucas said. "I'm just saying, I'm not exactly worried I'll be kidnapped and sold on some auction block somewhere or have nothing to do but lounge at your estate while you're saving your country. I'll make do and it will be amazing."

Dorian sighed. "I just worry that it's not safe."

"Dorian, nothing is ever safe. For anyone. Not in these troubled times. Peace talks between the templars and the mages blew up and neither of them had anything to do with that. The empress was targeted at a ball in her own palace. I was invited to Redcliffe by someone in charge there and clearly on my side and Alexius almost erased me from existence entirely. A good friend turned out to probably be out to end the world or something. Safety is an illusion and not what I really worry about."

"Yes, I know," Dorian said. "But there's a difference between normal not being safe and not being safe in Tevinter not being safe."

"The difference being that it's extra not safe there?" Lucas guessed.

"Exactly. And if you were anyone else I'd be okay risking it but you're the Inquisitor. The Orlesian Chantry's precious Herald of Andraste. The White Divine loves you. The Imperial Court loves you. The Magisterium never got around to condemning the Venatori who you tore apart. You stopped Corypheus before he made it clear that his plans to, how did Alexius put it, raise Tevinter from its own ashes were not in our best interests. It's too much of a risk and if anything happened to you, I'd…"

He didn't go on. He didn't have to.

"I know," Lucas said softly. "I do. But what's the alternative? Stay here? I don't care about here. I don't care about this. You can't keep running back and forth between Skyhold and the Imperium forever. I hate to think how much being with me has put your reform efforts back."

Dorian snorted. "Probably not much, actually. This is going to be a very big uphill battle."

"I just want to be with the man I love. Is that so much to ask?"

"Of course not," Dorian said immediately.

"And you're the one who has somewhere you need to be. I'm trying not to stand in the way of that. And my job's over here, regardless of what everyone else thinks or wants or plans. So just…let me come with you."

"I thought you didn't need my permission."

"I don't," Lucas agreed. "But I'd really rather not have you fighting me every step of the way when I absolutely move to Tevinter."

Dorian sighed. "Well, we still have time. There's still the Exalted Council and I'm still off to Tevinter again for a few weeks. Any number of things can happen between now and whenever we would have to decide."

"I mostly already decided."

"We can talk after the Exalted Council," Dorian said. "How about that? It would do no good to make a decision and then have, I don't know, the Madman of Zazikel rise up to try and kill us all and render the decision moot."

Lucas perked up. "Is it wrong that I kind of hope he does?"

"Lucas."

"What? I know, but he sounds kind of awesome. What do you have to do to get to be called the madman? And by ancient Tevinter, too! These people thought sending people to the Fade was a good idea. Though if it hadn't been for the Blight they couldn't have reasonably known about, it would have been fine."

It was remarkable, really. Lucas was more determined than ever to follow him home but Dorian still found himself laughing. One of these days he was going to lose the will to argue with him and then who knew what might happen? He certainly didn't. Lucas could even be right.

"We'll talk when I get back. After the Exalted Council," he said again.

"Yeah, we'll talk then," Lucas agreed. "We can talk about where's the best place to buy a house in Minrathous or if we should just skip the pretense and I'll move in with you."

"When I get back."

"I'm holding you to it," Lucas said. "Because this whole Exalted Council business? It's going to be the worst thing ever. I can just tell."

He probably even meant that. But since his current standard for worst thing ever was being thrown out of an organization he had already left, that probably didn't mean anything.

It would be fine. He would go to Tevinter, try and will encounters with his father to be less awkward, and come back to argue about Lucas' ideas for how Dorian should remodel his estate when Lucas did not actually know what it looked like.

It would be _fine_.

If he kept telling himself that, one day he might actually believe it.


End file.
